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Wednesday, November 14, 2012

Revolution

Revolution

Episode 8: Ties that
Bind

By: Carlos Uribe

Revolution
is a show set 15-years after electricity died.

Spoilers
Ahoy!

Who
is Nora? She's been presented as a former love interest of Monroe who
has problems with authority. She's good with explosives and guns. The
only reason that she's helping them is because she gave a promise to
Charlie. While she's been involved in the plot, the series hasn't
really done a lot to develop her character. The series decides that
this will be the episode that concentrates on her but she doesn't
really get that much fleshed out. This is because it doesn't focus on
any of the established information that we know about her. It doesn't
focus on her previous relationship with Monroe or the baby she had
lost that caused her to join the rebellion. It focused on an aspect
of her that is introduced in this episode and that's her relationship
with her sister. Finding out she has a sister is news to the
audience. The show decided that this relationship is so important
that it's going to focus the flashbacks and the main plot on that.
The problem is that since we barely really know Nora and know nothing
about her sister that this entire plot felt contrived and it didn't
really add anything to the actual character. All it did was continue
this series theme that people will do anything for family or even the
promise of family.

Let's
take Nora in the past. We're taken back to the time right after the
blackout. She's a young teenager with a little sister. The first time
we see them it's a shot of the two hiding under the bed from armed
men. When morning comes, Nora leaves her little sister to check on
her mother. When Nora finds the dead body of her mom, she decides
that she'll try to hide the truth from her little sister and to go to
their father's house. This takes a while since the two are from San
Antonio and their dad's house is in Galveston. It's kind of
surprising that the two young girls are able to make that trek within
a reasonable time frame. By kind of surprising, I mean it stretches
disbelief. It would have made much more sense to have the father's
home on the other side of San Antonio. Actually, San Antonio is too
big for that to properly work. Whatever the case, the show is asking
us to believe that these two young girls made it to Galveston without
any problems. That's not the biggest obstacle to this plot. The two
actresses shown to potray these young sisters are terrible and the
writing doesn't do them any favors. They appear more like how
television pretends children to be than actual children. Not once
does it seem believable that they are actually sisters. The
flashbacks are supposed to establish the bond between them but it
fails in their very purpose.

The
attempt to fail to establish the bond in the flashbacks hurt the main
plot where the core of the conflict was with Nora's sister. Whenever
the two are on screen together, the writing regresses and they never
appear like they're actual siblings. It actually feels like this is
the first time they've met and they don't really care that much about
each other. This is partly the writing but also the casting. There
are many different kinds of chemistry on television and one of those
types is the one that makes you believe people are family. There is
no chemistry that leads you to believe these two sisters are actually
related. The entire conflict of the episode about whether Nora should
chose her family or not feels forced because of this. When her sister
betrays Nora's friends once Nora leaves with her, it's supposed to
come as a big surprise. It doesn't not only because it's predictable
but because the series failed to convince me that there's any actual
bond between the two. That we don't know who Mia really is also
ensures that the betrayal doesn't really resonate.

This
is a pity because everything outside the relationship between Nora
and her sister worked like a charm. Strausser is an effective villain
whose able to get the necklace from Aaron even though he doesn't get
Miles. Monroe is pleased because he knows that the necklace is key to
turning the power back on. Monroe also has to deal with problems
within the milita. Neville's son is being beat up for asking
questions and Monroe is threatening to send him to California.
Neville decides to respond by alerting Monroe that a colleague's son
actually joined the rebellion. Monroe decides that he'll allow
Neville to try and control his own son. It does convince Neville's
wife to encourage him to overthrow Monroe. Everything that is
happening at the capitol is getting more interesting than what's
happening on the road.

Ties
that Bind is an episode that has many good elements but it fails to
come together to form a good epsiode because it's core is bad. The
episode is supposed to be about the bond between Nora and her sister
but it never actually establishes that bond to begin with. This is
supposed to be Nora's episode but it doesn't develop her in any
beneficial way. Ties that Bind needed to establish that sisterly bond
in order to work.

Other Notes:

The
preview for the next episode makes it look like it's going to be the
episode where Danny gets rescued and the magic pendants are fought
over. The marketing decided that this wasn't the hook of the episode:
the Led Zeppelin music was.